"Draw a long breath and hold it!" commanded the voice. She tried to do as she was told, when with a sudden plunge she was immersed head and all, for what seemed an interminable length of time. At last she felt her head raised above the surface. "Keep it up—so!" was the order. The icy current more than once forced her from her feet, causing her to slip under, and the atmosphere of the place struck a chill to her very marrow. Once again the ground gave way beneath her, and she felt the man's strong arm pulling her after him, while he swam in water too deep for wading.
But the girl's senses could no longer stand the strain of cold, fatigue and terror, and at this point she suddenly became unconscious. How the rest of the journey was accomplished she could never imagine, for she knew no more till she came to herself in what seemed to be some sort of narrow hallway. A door was opened and she was rudely thrust inside with the exclamation: "There!—at length!—I thought I should never get thee here!" Then the door was slammed to, and loudly bolted.
[REUNITED]
CHAPTER XII
REUNITED
For a time Jacqueline sat huddled and motionless in the corner where she had fallen. Her eyes were still bandaged, her mouth was gagged and her hands were tied behind her. She wondered vaguely whether they would ever come to release her from these bonds, and she shivered pitifully in her wet garments. Finally she roused herself and struggled feebly to free her hands. Her surprise was great when she found that the cords fell apart easily, but it was not till later that she guessed the secret—they had probably been severed nearly through before she was pushed into the room.